Anatomy of a Traditional Agent to
Unbundled Agent

Does the current market and state of the profession concern you? If not, it should. As an industry that’s feverishly held on to the same “one-size-fits-all” business model for more than one-hundred years, it’s time we reinvented ourselves and unbundled our services and talents to better assist today’s savvy real estate consumer.

Here’s why. The real estate meltdown has consumers wondering whom they can trust. They assumed they could trust the lender that got them into the mortgage loan with a payment that’s now adjusting into the stratosphere. They assumed that their home equity would continue to rise as a type of forced savings plan for their future. And now, in the aftermath, real estate consumers are disillusioned and searching for a trusted advisor that won’t sell them anything (unless they want to buy) and can provide impartial, factual information to help them solve their myriad real estate problems. And since many of today’s consumers have real estate concerns that don’t involve listing or purchasing (like helping them protest the assessed value of their property) there’s never been a better time to become a Consumer-Certified Real Estate Consultant® (C-CREC®).

“Step Away from FREE!”

The statistics of fewer transactions and low profitability speak for themselves…”free” is killing the real estate profession. If you stop to tally up just how much more “free” traditional agents do today than they did just a few years ago, it’s frightening! It runs the gamut from free comparative market analyses to spinning wheels on a short-sale that’s unlikely to ever close. And why does this happen? We’ve erroneously been taught that we need to offer free in order to compete professionally with our peers. Nothing could be further from the truth.

When was the last time you saw an orthodontist putting free braces on a child in order to compete with his fellow professional---or a CPA taking on a gratis IRS case just to showcase her value? Unless and until we scrap free in our profession, it will be difficult to elevate the sometimes consumer-perceived status from high-pressured salesperson to trusted advisor.

It’s Your Decision: “Free” or “Fee”!

By unbundling your services and providing fee-for-services real estate consulting, (also known as real estate a la carte) you turn your focus from activities-busy work to result-oriented outcome. In other words, you no longer “major in minors”. The services you offer focus on your professional value (often on an hourly basis) with profit built into the equation/pricing formula. Instead of working for FREE, you’re charging a professional FEE! In fact, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because once you put a tangible value on your time and talents, you want to do more of what works, not what doesn’t.

If these concepts resonate with you and your professional ideals, you owe it to yourself to become unbundled as a C-CREC® designee and join the Consumer-Centric REvolution in real estate!

If you’d like to learn more about profitability and fee-for-services, sign up to take the C-CREC® designation here.